After his three-year reign as high school heartthrob of Nickelodeon's Victorious, Avan Jogia is expanding his empire. His title role in the Spike TV miniseries Tut, about the Egyptian pharaoh's life, marks the 23-year-old actor's ascent into leading man territory. Next, the Vancouver native depicts James Franco's lover in I Am Michael; OD's in 10,000 Saints; and gets swept up by bandit lovers in Shangri-La Suite. Just before the premiere of Tut, which airs in three parts this week (9pm July 19-21), Jogia called us up to talk about Zeppelin, his Tudor heritage, and the Kenzo campaign film he recently filmed with director Gregg Araki.

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Harper's BAZAAR: Hi, Avan.

Avan Jogia: Hi. This is nice and crisp. I haven't had a phone call on a landline for a very long time.

HB: How very retro of you. I assume you're sitting at a long conference room table with your feet up?

AJ: Oh, absolutely. So corporate. Look at us go.

HB: What are you doing this weekend to celebrate Tut's premiere?

AJ: I'm actually taking off to Italy for the Ischia Film Festival. I won breakout actor of the year, so I'll be there with my film, 10,000 Saints. I don't go to many of these festivals, so it will be great.

AJ: Yeah, to sword fight and ride chariots—and all kinds of stuff. Riding chariots is interesting. It's a little bit more like riding a car than a horse, but it's really hard. And shooting a bow and arrow from a chariot's even harder.

HB: How's your aim?

AJ: Once I got the shaking down, all right. I mean, I wouldn't allow myself to go into battle against the Huns, but I'm not bad.

HB: How did you like Morocco, where you filmed for four months?

AJ: It's really beautiful, and it's a lovely culture, from the clothes to the design of the buildings, to the carpets—everything is so beautifully made. We were in a little town called Ouarzazate, which is a smaller town, so I got to meet a lot of locals there. As far as the food goes, chicken tagine is the one I'd recommend.

HB: Did your girlfriend, Zoey Deutsch, get to visit?

AJ: I had four days off while Zoey visited—that was my only four days off during the entire shoot—and we took the car and went to Essaouira, a tiny little beach town on the northern coast, very close to Spain. It's beautiful, and Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin recorded there.

HB: What a slacker, taking four days off. Are you a big classic rock fan?

AJ: I know, a real slacker. I love classic rock. And Orson Welles shot Othello on the beaches there—that was kind of cool too. It's got a lot of entertainment history.

HB: Who are your classic rock heroes?

AJ: Obviously Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, the Stones, and then a bit more recently I would say Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Shane McGowan.

HB: Do you go to a lot of concerts?

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AJ: I do. I just saw Nick Cave at the Hammerstein a few months ago. He puts on a really, really good show.

AJ: It depends on the role I'm playing. I make little playlists for each character, things that will help me think of the vibe.

HB: What's on Tut's playlist?

AJ: Oddly enough, No Pussy Blues by Grinderman.

HB: You have the most luscious hair. Do you always keep it long?

AJ: I just keep on growing it until someone tells me to cut it. I don't think I'd cut my hair if I didn't have to work.

HB: Do you have any tattoos?

AJ: Five. I've got a chest piece, I've got something on my leg, my upper leg, I've got a shoulder, and a back, and something up my lower arm. They're all different—I've got a pocket watch on my back that has the Tudor rose in it. My mother's a Tudor, and my father's family are all watch makers, so that's for my parents. Then I have the motto of the Nautilus on my left arm, which is "mobilis in mobili", meaning "movement within mobility" or "changing within the changes."

HB: Are you planning to get any more?

AJ: Well, I always say no, but then after a year or so I'm like, "I'll just get another one." Usually if I have a job or life moment that really meant something to me I get a tattoo for it.

HB: Are they easy to cover up for roles?

AJ: It takes a lot of makeup. And sometimes, like during sex scenes, it doesn't stay for very long.

HB: And all of a sudden, Tut has some new ink.

AJ: One of my tattoos is Latin, which wouldn't be developed for another how many years? [Laughs]

HB: He was definitely not a Tudor.What do you do to relax after a long day of shooting?

AJ: I write. I play guitar. I do something creative that doesn't have the same pressures as other creative aspects of my life.

HB: Do you play music with other people?

AJ: Yeah, I play with my brother, who plays keyboard and piano and does music production. We write a little bit together, and eventually at some point I'll have something that I'll probably release. But I don't really have pop ambitions.

HB: What do you always have on set with you?

AJ: My headphones, my sunglasses, and my iPod. If I need a moment to take a break, I will put on the sunglasses and headphones and get into a little zone.

HB: Tell me about the short film that you did with director Gregg Araki for Kenzo, Here Now.

AJ: Gregg is doing a semi-sequel to his movie Nowhere, and I grew up admiring his films. I had met him a couple times before. I also love Umberto [Leon] and Carol [Lim]. They're very sweet and cool, and make beautiful clothes. I play a sensitive loner who is madly in love with a girl who doesn't love him. It's got these overtones of anxiety and doomsday.

HB: You got into acting at a pretty young age. What interested you about it?

AJ: I thought that the transformative properties of being an actor were so interesting—the fact of being able to be an astronaut and a writer and a swimmer, instead of just one thing. Acting allows you to do everything.

HB: And you moved to LA nearly right away. Did you do that alone?

AJ: No, I moved with my mother. She moved down with me when I first started, and then when I got Victorious, she moved back up to Vancouver and visited me every once in a while. I was living on my own by the time I was eighteen.